Reward
by Zerodone
Summary: (Two-Shot). After saving her mother from the Ultra Beasts, Lillie decides Moon deserves the greatest reward she can give the girl. In this case it means becoming part of a rather huge family.


A/N: So, I upgraded my grammar checker to premium and decided to use this two-shot (originally a one-shot, but it got too long) as a "guinea pig." Apparently, I use a lot of passive terms and often my sentences are unclear to the reader. There are still a lot of times I don't agree with my program, for example, I kept a lot of the passive terms in this story and I prefer not to put a comma in front of the word "and." Tell me what you think of this and for once Grammar Nazis are welcome to double check.

("Life is a funny thing,") Moon thought to herself, as she was lying in the grass, her arms crossed behind her head and staring idly into the orange sky. ("If someone had told me I would become the champion of any region, really, I would have laughed straight at their face.") The girl let out a content sigh, a small smile creeping up on her face. ("But, look at me now. First ever champion of Alola caught all the Ultra Beasts…) She turned her head to the side and found Nihilego playing with Eevee. The normal-type tried to capture the tentacles of the beast, while the poison and rock-type retracted the limbs at the last possible moment. It was hard to imagine that this gentle pokémon had only a couple of weeks ago been part of the reason Lusamine had basically gone bonkers.

Moon let out another sigh, as she returned her attention to the sky. Lusamine was a tricky subject. It took some time, but eventually, Moon managed to gather as to what she thought was the whole story. Somehow, this part is still unclear to the girl, Lusamine had encountered a Nihilego and got poisoned by it. From personal experience, Moon could attest that it took Ultra Beasts a lot of time to get used to this dimension. They got aggressive real quick. Nihilego's toxin also had the not so nice side effect to mess with the victim's brain. It also didn't help that Lusamine's husband had gone missing shortly before the incident, which already must have taken a toll on her psyche.

("I'm glad Lusamine is on her way to recovery.") Moon thought to herself. Yes, luckily the woman had been conscious enough to create an antidote, Moon didn't know that the blonde woman had multiple PhDs, but she never managed to finish it. Luckily enough the people of the Aether Foundation could quickly finish it, and up until this very moment, the woman was receiving treatment. Though for some reason both Lillie and Gladion had organized for their mother to be treated at their private mansion, instead of a hospital.

("Speaking of them, I haven't seen either of them in weeks.") Moon took out her cell phone and watched the picture she had chosen as a background. It showed Lillie, herself and Nebby before she evolved to Lunala all laughing at the camera, which Moon had been awkwardly holding with her hand. ("I could call them and ask how everyone is doing.") She put her cell phone back into her pocket and resumed watching the sky overhead. ("But I guess I should give them their time. Their family has been through a lot and they deserve some alone time together.")

As this last thought went through her brain, both Nihilego and Eevee approached Moon, seemingly done playing their little game. Without even asking for permission, Eevee jumped onto Moon's stomach and made it herself comfortable, while Nihilego appeared to be content merely floating right next to his trainer. Moon reached out with her arm towards the Ultra Beast, to which it wrapped a tentacle around her arm. She didn't allow her pokémon to do this with anyone else, as one wrong move, like a jerk reaction or applying too much pressure, could cause the Ultra Beast to accidentally release tiny poison spikes and insert it directly into the bloodstream of the unfortunate human. It was definitely a risk not worth taking. But Nihilego loved soft body contact of all kinds and it helped Moon in the past getting the pokémon to trust her.

("I wonder if there are more Ultra Beasts out there somewhere? I mean, we have over 800 pokémon on this dimension. Maybe there are 800 more in another dimension?") she wondered to herself. ("Or, who knows? There could be alien pokémon out there somewhere.") Moon grinned to herself. That would be exciting, meeting an alien species. But if the champion was honest with herself, the aliens could wait. She had experienced enough excitement ever since she arrived in Alola just months ago. A little bit of dull day to day routine in life couldn't hurt.

Just as Moon decided it wouldn't hurt to close her eyes for half an hour or so, her phone began angrily vibrating in her pocket. It was loud enough to catch Eevee's and Nihilego's attention. The two watched curiously as Moon took out her cell phone and looked at the display. It was an unknown number. Raising an eyebrow, she accepted the call and held the phone to her ear.

"Hello? This is Moon speaking?"

"Hi Moon!" a bright voice spoke from the other line, causing the champion to smile instantly.

"Lillie!" the champion exclaimed. "How's it going?"

"I'm feeling great!" Lillie replied.

"That's good to hear! Jeez, I haven't heard from you in ages!"

"Sorry, I'm really sorry," the blonde apologized.

"It's alright," Moon shook her head, even though Lillie couldn't see her. "It must be hard for you all. Hey, speaking of, is your mom feeling better?"

There was a short pause. "Yes," came the eventual reply. "Better definitely, but far from what I would consider healthy. It also doesn't help that she's constantly leaving the bed! She says it's time for her to be what a mother is supposed to be and tries to cook us food, do the laundry or go so far as to buy groceries."

Moon blinked surprised. This was not what she had been expecting to hear from her best friend. "Wow. That's… unusual." The champion could hear Lillie sigh on the other end.

"The doctors think this is still a side effect of the poison. Gladion and I are doing our best to keep her in bed, but she's just so stubborn."

"Don't you have a butler for these kinds of things?" Moon asked. After all, Lillie's family was loaded. Even with her new budget as a champion, Moon's money reserves didn't even come close to the "pocket money" Lillie was getting from her mother.

"Yes, which makes it even more frustrating. But enough about this. The reason I call is for I wanted to ask you if you could come over and visit," the blonde explained.

"Really? Would that be okay?"

"Of course it would!"

"What about your mother?"

"Mmm…" there was another short pause "To be honest, she's the one who asked if you could come over. I think she wants to apologize to you for everything personally."

"Uh-huh." ("Lusamine wants to apologize to me? I guess it would be best to start over with her. It's not like she's responsible for her actions, to begin with.") "Alright. I'll be there tomorrow morning. Sounds good?"

"Yes! I'm looking forward to it!"

XXX

Just as Lillie placed the phone back to its place, Gladion spoke up from behind his sister.

"Are you sure about this?" he asked her in his usual stoic manner.

Lillie turned around and gave her brother a confident smile. "Of course!" she told him directly in the face. "Soon enough, Moon will be a part of our family!"

Gladion sighed and shook his head. "Don't get ahead of yourself, Lillie. Once she sees them, there's a good chance she's going to freak out and panic."

But Lillie's confident smile never disappeared from her face.

"I know Moon better than you, Gladion. Trust me. I know what I am doing."

XXX

As promised, the next day Moon found herself in front of Lusamine's mansion. Boy, it had been a real shocker seeing this massive building for the first time, but given that Lillie's family founded the Aether Foundation it shouldn't have come as that big of a surprise. Still, Moon found herself intimidated by the sheer size of the building, as it appeared to glare down on her, throwing a huge shadow on her.

Tearing her gaze from the overall building, Moon quickly approached the front doors and pressed the doorbell. The sound echoed through the entire mansion. The champion briefly wondered just how loud the doorbell had to be to be heard in the whole building. But she didn't have much time to ponder, as the door was almost ripped out of its hinges when Lillie opened the door.

"Moon!" The girl screamed in excitement and almost threw herself at the black haired girl, wrapping her arms around the champion.

"Hey Lillie," Moon greeted back, wrapping her arms around the blonde. "Aw, missed me that much?"

"What? Can't I hug my best friend?" Lillie asked back, giggling.

"Well, I think there's someone else who also wants a cuddle." As if on cue, Nebby burst out of her pokéball, attached to Moon's belt and appeared behind the champion.

"Nebby!" Lillie happily exclaimed. She let go of Moon and walked up to the legendary pokémon, who floated downwards to allow the girl to gently grab Nebby's face and gently press their foreheads together. "How are you doing, Nebby? I hope you aren't constantly breaking out of your pokéball."

Nebby let out a happy cry and gently nuzzled Lillie's cheek.

"She's been a gem," Moon informed Lillie. "She helped me to keep the Ultra Beasts in line after I first caught them. Trust me. I would have been lost without her."

Lillie smiled proudly, like a parent who just heard her child getting complimented by a teacher.

"You have been a good girl, Nebby." Lillie petted the huge legendary pokémon all over her body. Nebby hummed in approval. "I hope you don't mind. You have to stay out here for a little bit. I am going to show Moon the special place."

Nebby's eyes widened in surprise, as she heard Lillie say those words. Moon in the meantime could only tilt her head in confusion.

"Special place?" she repeated. Lillie turned her head to the champion, smiling very brightly. "It's something I wanted to show you for a while, but the opportunity was never right. Sadly, Nebby is too big to come with us. Ah, but I prepared food for your pokémon! We can let them play behind the house, while I show you the special place!"

"Really? You prepared food for my pokémon? That's very kind of you," Moon commented.

"Oh please, it's the least I could do," Lillie waved off. "That way, they can spend their time out in the fresh air, instead of being confined to their balls the whole time."

"All right! Oh no, wait a moment!" the champion suddenly remembered something. "I completely forgot, I have Nihilego with me right now. I don't think your mother would take too kindly seeing him, huh?"

Lillie frowned, knowing what her friend meant. "Yes, mom is… not too fond of the Ultra Beasts anymore," the blonde spoke slowly. "But she's also still sleeping right now. She needs a lot of it these days and she usually wakes up around noon."

"Wow. Your mom needs that much sleep?" Moon inquired, to which Lillie nodded.

"It is necessary for her recovery. Also, the antidote has a small side-effect of making her drowsy," Lillie explained.

"Okay. Well, if it is really no problem…" Moon looked over at Nebby. "Can you keep an eye on everyone, while we're gone?"

XXX

As it turned out the so-called "special place" was located inside a cave. The tunnel was relatively small, hence why Nebby couldn't go with them. Before she evolved it, probably had been no problem for the legendary to go with Lillie, but now the legendary was just too big.

Moon had been slightly nervous at first, going inside the cave without any pokémon support, seeing as those places were perfect homes for all kinds of pokémon. And oh boy, they sure didn't like it, when someone invaded without any forewarning. But Lillie assured her that the pokémon living here didn't mind the occasional human taking a stroll. Case in point, she had been going here countless times and came out of it unscratched. Moon guessed since the mention was roughly fifty meters away from the entrance to the cave and since Lillie had been somewhat of a regular visitor, the pokémon just had gotten used to her and maybe even saw her as part of their community.

Still, the two had been wandering for ten minutes and not even a Geodude had made its presence known. This was somewhat unusual, for when Moon explored a cave, she had to be ready to get ambushed at any possible corner.

"It's like this place is deserted," Moon commented as she flashed the light to the ceiling. Nope, not a single zubat in sight.

"The pokémon here live deeper inside the cave, where there is more space," Lillie explained.

"I see… though, that's the first time I hear about you being comfortable around wild pokémon."

Lillie bit her lip but didn't turn around. "They're… special," she said after a second of thinking. "You'll see what I mean soon."

("Lillie's acting kinda strange today.") Moon noted. ("It feels like she wants me to see this special place as fast as possible. She was never that impatient before. Is impatient even the right word here? She does seem to be in a hurry and I don't smell the usual repellent on her. Maybe this is just another way of her trying to change?")

After traversing through the cavern for a couple of more minutes, the passage did indeed widen considerably. The ceiling also got higher and instead of walking in a straight line, the path became curvier and split on occasion. Moon made sure to stay close to Lillie, to not get accidentally lost. The champion was about to comment on all of this when the distinguished noise of something wet splashing on the ground caught her attention. Shining the flashlight downwards, Moon noticed that she had stepped into some kind of purple slime. And from the looks of things, the slime wasn't just some random puddle. It covered the whole ground onwards.

"What is this stuff?" asked Moon, as she examined the bottom of her shoe. Indeed she had never seen anything like this substance before. In a way, it looked kind of like it was liquified flesh. She was about to put her finger on her dirty shoe when Lillie suddenly grabbed her arm and stopped her.

"What? Lillie?"

"Be careful, Moon. This stuff is poisonous to humans," Lillie warned her, to which Moon took an involuntary step backward.

"P-poisonous?!" she exclaimed, shocked.

"Yes, but only if you eat it or rub it on an open wound," the blonde quickly added, calming the champion down considerably.

("For a moment I really thought I was a goner.") "Jeez, for a moment you really scared me," Moon said with a kind-hearted smile.

"I'm sorry. But I thought I should let you know from the beginning."

"Y-yeah, I can see that. Still," Moon looked on the ground. "What is this stuff? It almost looks like it's pulsating. And where does it come from?"

Moon looked at Lillie expectantly and found the girl holding a hand under her chin, seemingly being lost deep in thought. The champion waited patiently for her friend to say something, which took about a minute or so.

"It's… hard to explain. I think it's better that I show you everything." Lillie smiled. "Don't worry. It's not far. Oh." Something appeared to have caught Lillie's attention, as she was shining the flashlight into the hallway where the slime seemed to have originated from. Moon was about to ask what was wrong when she heard something coming from the way Lillie was pointing her flashlight. The champion mirrored her best friend's movements, enlightening a larger area of the cave. The source of the noise became apparent in a matter of seconds and when it appeared, Moon couldn't suppress a gasp escaping her lips.

("That's gotta be the ugliest, yet coolest pokémon I have ever seen.") Moon thought to herself. It was a pretty big pokémon, bug-type from the looks of things. It walked on four legs, had two claws on each, more teeth than a sharpedo, thick carapace on its back, a tail and even a pair of wings, though they were way too short for flying purposes. Maybe when it evolved, it would become part flying-type. The pokémon looked at the two humans with glowing eyes, seemingly curious.

Lillie giggled and walked over to the unknown pokémon.

"I don't think that is a good…" Moon didn't manage to finish that sentence, as she saw Lillie petting the pokémon. With its head, it leaned into the girl's touch and let out a low growl, which probably was the equivalent sound of purring to those creatures. At least Moon guessed this was the case. Pokémon behavior aside, the champion was pretty surprised that Lillie was even capable of petting such a huge pokémon without showing even a hint of nervousness. It's not like the blonde is afraid of pokémon or anything, but Lillie had never been the bravest either, and when even Moon was feeling a little nervous upon meeting a pokémon with so many teeth and tiny spikes on its back, Lillie should be shaking in her boots. Emphasize on "should be."

Instead, the girl looked over to the champion and motioned her to come closer. After hesitating for a second Moon walked over to her friend and the bug-type, the champion assumed it was a bug-type.

"Hihi, I told you they know me," Lillie couldn't help but giggle at the surprised face her friend was making.

"Yeah… you did…" Moon said slowly while turning her attention towards the pokémon. That thing was so big, it easily reached her height and even surpassed it a little. The pokémon in return eyed the champion for a couple of seconds, before returning its attention to Lillie. The pokémon rubbed itself against Lillie's leg and let out some happy chitters. When Lillie returned her hands and arms to herself, the pokémon gave her one final look, before walking back where it came from.

"That was… an interesting pokémon." And Moon genuinely meant what she said. That pokémon had been pretty exciting to her. She had never seen anything that sprouted so many spikes and teeth and could only imagine what it could do to other pokémon.

Moon found herself yanked out of her thoughts by none other than Lillie, who was tugging her at her arm. "Come on! We're almost there! Be careful not to slip!"

"Hey, wait!"

Splashing sounds echoed throughout the cave, as the champion found herself being dragged through the said cave by her overexcited friend. Lillie's behavior so far had been just a little off from the norm, but now Moon found Lillie acted more like Hau. The action the blonde took reminded the champion of how Hau would drag herself and Lillie into the next best malasada shop, whenever he got hungry. Moon could feel some of the toxic, mushy, purple-y stuff getting on her legs. She made a mental note to wash them later thoroughly. Lillie sounded quite serious about her warning earlier.

Strange enough, despite the speed they were going, they never caught up with the pokémon from earlier. After all, the thing had just casually walked back last Moon saw it. Did it decide to run for some reason? Whatever the case, Moon quickly forgot about it, as she could see a light at the end of the tunnel coming right up. From this perspective, it looked like the cave was about to end. This turned out to be a wrong assumption. The cave didn't stop, rather it expanded into one large room, so to say, which had an open ceiling, allowing the sunlight to come in.

Lillie and Moon were standing as to what can be described the top of a valley, which outstretched right in front of them. A multitude of natural rock formations blocked the view now and then and there was a rather big lake in the center of this "valley." It would have been easily a breathtaking sight to behold if it weren't for a few things distorting the landscape. The first was the purple mush. It covered almost everything in the area. It even grew on the walls. Only a couple of rocks sticking out like islands in a purple sea were left clean. But that wasn't even what got Moon's attention. No, what got her attentions were the fleshy structures scattered across the landscape. They came in all kinds of shape, sizes and teeth growing out of the buildings themselves! One "building," if you could call it that, looked from above like a big mouth filled with green acid. Another one had the rough shape of a tower. Moon was unable to come up with a description for the rest of the buildings since they resembled nothing of the like she had ever seen. But all of this was just the icing on the cake.

Pokémon. Lots and lots and a whole lot more pokémon were living in this area. They too came in all kinds of shapes and sizes and appeared to be all bug-types. Moon could feel her head getting dizzy from seeing so many pokémon at once. She felt the need to support herself against a wall, while her jaw slowly but surely lowered itself to the ground. Lillie couldn't help herself but giggle at the face her best friend was making. It was a reaction the blonde had entirely expected, but seeing it for herself was something else. As funny as the situation was, Lillie decided to snap her friend out of her stupor by snapping her fingers in front of Moon's face. The champion blinked a couple of times before she shook her head and looked over at her best friend.

"Lillie…I…I…" Moon took in a deep breath through her nose and let it out slowly through her lips. "I have seen a lot of weird things these past months, but this?!" The champion gestured towards the valley. "What is this?" she asked.

"A nest," Lillie replied with a bright smile.

"A nest?" Moon echoed, though in her mind it made sense. All of those buildings looked like these pokémon could have made them. Although for some reason Moon got the distinct impression the buildings themselves were alive. It was the fleshy looking part that made her believe that.

"I have wanted you to show this for a long time," Lillie explained, her smile seemingly growing. "This nest and everyone living here, so far only my family knows about all of this. Not even the highest employees of the Aether Foundation know about this place. You are the first outsider seeing this."

Moon could hear the weight Lillie's words carried with them. Immediately several questions arose in Moon's mind, for example why Lillie's family apparently tried to keep the world in the dark about a bunch of new pokémon species. But Moon stayed quiet for the time being. Experience had taught her the explanation would soon follow.

"You're wondering why my family has kept all of this a secret," it was a statement, not a question, Moon noted.

"For you see, Moon. My family… isn't exactly normal."

Now, this was something Moon would have liked to inquire further about. However the words got stuck in her throat, as all of the sudden Lillie herself started changing right in front of Moon. The blonde's hair turned into spiky dreadlocks, her skin tone became lilac and grew a chitin-like armor. It was spiky at some parts. Lillie's eyes were shining for a couple of seconds. When it died down, her eyes were no longer blue but had the same color as her skin. Her lips weren't spared from the recolor. The sound of clothing being ripped apart could be heard. The source turned out to be Lillie's shoulder as small spikes grew out of them. All in all, the transformation didn't take long, but when it was done, Moon found herself paralyzed by what she just witnessed. She couldn't even say if it was due to fear or sheer amazement, but it was one of those things that caused the champion to stare with an open mouth at her bug-looking best friend.

For her part, Lillie's smile had disappeared from her face. In fact, now that this was over, her behavior was more like what Moon was used to from her best friend. The girl was nervously glancing over to the champion while tapping her fingers or rather claws against one another.

"Well…?" Lillie asked nervously. But the only answer Moon could give consisted of nothing more than incomprehensible sounds. Lillie could see that the champion's right pinky finger was twitching. It was quite apparent that Moon's brain had not only crashed but also had trouble rebooting itself. Feeling slightly guilty, Lillie reached out with her hand and gently shook Moon on her shoulder.

"Moon?"

"W-whaaa...? Li~li~li~lillie?" Moon spoke in a slightly confused tone. The girl blinked a couple of times until her gaze focused on the blonde. Well, former blonde, she looked much purpler now.

"Are you alright?" Lillie asked, her voice echoing as if multiple Lillies were speaking at once.

"What... what happened to you?" the champion asked in a meek tone.

Lillie had to resist the urge to sigh. She instead gently squeezed Moon's shoulder in an attempt to calm the girl down. "I am showing you my true form," Lillie spoke in a gentle tone, though given the psionic echoing, she probably might have as well shouted the words on top of her lungs. Still, Moon didn't show any signs of attempting to run away so far, which was a plus.

"For you see Moon, I am not human. Neither is Gladion, my mother or any of the creatures you see here." She motioned with her free arm over to the colony. "We are all aliens."

And there was the second bombshell for the day. Lillie could feel the human tensing up in her grip. Her breathing paced up, Lillie could almost feel the blood inside the champion's body flowing at extreme speed. Moon's eyes seemingly darted around randomly, but the alien girl could see that her best friend was rapidly shifting her focus on various body parts that belonged to Lillie.

Slowly Moon raised her arm that wasn't hold by Lillie and put her hand on Lillie's arm. It was the alien girl's turn to tense up, but only for a moment. Because the next, the human girl started to rub her hand over Lillie's arm slowly.

"Eh... Moon?" Lillie wasn't sure what to make of this. Sure she could just use her psionic abilities and enter Moon's mind to see what the girl was thinking, but Lillie grew up among humans and knew how much they liked their privacy. As such, she quietly stood still and waited for Moon to do... well, whatever she would do.

Eventually, the human girl stopped rubbing the arm and instead came closer to Lillie. The alien girl found herself slightly taken off guard, especially when the champion decided to lean in and inspected the alien's face. Lillie found herself bending backward and blinked a little dumbfounded at her friend's behavior.

"What are you doing?" the alien asked.

Moon didn't answer the question. From how "far off" her eyes appeared to be there was a good chance she didn't notice in the first place. Plus after the next sentence the champion spoke, it was all but assured that she had not been listening.

"You...are...an...alien," Moon stated slowly, making big pauses between each word.

"Y-yes," Lillie nodded.

What came next was something the alien definitely did not expect. Or at least, she didn't expect it to come so quickly.

"AWESOME!" Moon shouted on top of her lungs, causing Lillie to jump in her place. Her loud voice also caused every other alien to stop dead in its track and look over to the two girls. The human one proceeded to throw her arms around Lillie's neck and gave her one big hug in the process.

"Awesome~, awesome~, awesome~, awesome~!" The black haired girl sang like Christmas had come early. Lillie couldn't help but smile and wrap her arms around her best friend. She also felt a great sense of relief going through her body. Knowing her own strength all too well, the alien girl minded herself not to put too much pressure on her companion's body.

"Ow!"

Apparently, that didn't save Moon from the random spikes that grew out of Lillie's body.

XXX

On that day Moon would learn a lot of things. One of them being was that Lillie was incredibly strong. The alien girl could easily carry Moon in bridal style and with the injured human in arms, the chitin covered girl ran all the way down to one of the buildings, which Lillie would later explain was a Hive. Out of said Hive stepped one of the aliens or Zerg as Lillie called herself and the other creatures. Out of the building came a Zerg whose upper body looked kind of female, similar to that of a human. That's where the similarities ended, however. The downer part of the body reminded Moon, a lot of spider pokémon, only the Queen walked on six legs and didn't really resemble a spider at all. It was just the closest thing Moon could come with to describe the creature.

While Moon inspected the for her unknown creatures, Lillie readjusted her grip on the human girl, so that the Queen had better access to the leg wound Lillie accidentally inflicted upon her best friend. Moon watched with curiosity written all over her face as the Zerg inspected the wound for a couple of seconds, which by the way stung, but was only superficial. After being done with the inspection, the creature all of the sudden vomited something orange on Moon's leg. Before the girl could even feel disgusted, she let out a hiss as whatever just got on her leg made the wound burn. However just as quick as the pain came, it disappeared. As the orange stuff washed off the leaked blood from her leg, it was revealed that the wound had gone entirely.

While Moon was still staring in amazement at her leg, Lillie gently placed the human girl back on her feet. Naturally, Moon just couldn't sit still. She just had to inspect the Queen from top to bottom. Lillie ordered the Queen to hold still, while the champion was busy prodding and probing the alien life form. Lillie had put on a bit of a gamble when she exposed Moon directly to the Zerg without any forewarning. From personal interactions with the champion, the princess knew that the girl from Kanto wasn't scared so easily and had a wide variety of interests, aside from pokémon. These included, but were not limited to the exploration of space, monster movies, plush dolls, ghosts and lots more. Plus Lillie had seen how Moon initially reacted to the Ultra Beasts, as such she had hoped the champion would give the Zerg the benefit of the doubt.

Seeing as everything had gone reasonably well, it was time to properly introduce Moon to the Zerg and after that...


End file.
